Putting the Oyster Reefs Back Into Oyster Harbour

Restoring Albany’s lost shellfish reefs

The warming of the fresh salty air that has swept in from the Southern Ocean off the south coast of Western Australia for millennia, signalled the time of the year that Minang Noongar people returned to the coast. Closer to the sea, they made use of its many marine resources after a winter inland, sheltering from the harsher weather and living off the land. In the bays near Albany, they made stone traps to catch fish as the tide went out, adding seafood to a diet of bushmeat, birds’ eggs and plants.

When English explorer George Vancouver became the first European to visit the area in 1791 he was so impressed by the amount and size of the oysters growing here that he named it Oyster Harbour.

Unfortunately, early European settlers found so many uses for the oysters that by the late 1800s they remained associated with the harbour in name only. The combined effects of over harvesting, poor water quality and disease meant the oyster reefs of Oyster Harbour were no more.

With the loss of the reefs came a further decline in natural values such as water quality and fish stocks.

This sadly familiar scenario has been repeated across southern Australia, however, thankfully it’s not too late to do something about it.

Sign up to email updates

Replicating Our Reef Restoration Success

As we’ve done elsewhere across southern Australia, in Albany we’re restoring the lost shellfish reefs of Oyster Harbour so that once again the local area, people and marine environment can benefit from all the services a thriving reef provides. This includes a boost to fish productivity, improved water quality and increased overall biodiversity in the harbour.

And we couldn’t do it without the help of our partners and supporters including South Coast NRM, University of Western Australia, Recfishwest, Albany Shellfish Hatchery, Great Southern Development Commission WA, Fishing Industry Council, Aquaculture Council of WA, City of Albany, local schools and the Western Australian State Government (with funding from Royalties for Regions and the Recreational Fishing Initiatives Fund).

Our partners and supporters are all extremely important if we are to successfully restore Oyster Harbour's lost shellfish reefs.

The first step in restoring the reefs was to successfully demonstrate that native oysters could be collected from Oyster Harbour, spawned in the local hatchery, deployed onto new reef substrate and reach the minimum level of survival required to recover a shellfish reef. With the help of the Recreational Fishing Initiative Fund and Recfishwest, we achieved this in 2016.

With the pilot phase complete, the next step is tobuildover 800m2 of reconstructed oyster reefs in Oyster Harbour by July 2020. The reefs are constructed with a base of hundreds of tonnes of limestone rocks deployed from a barge. On top of this we will scatter one million hatchery-reared juvenile Australian Flat Oysters grown at the local Albany Shellfish Hatchery. The young shellfish will settle and continue to grow on the limestone, establishing themselves in their new homes and attracting all the other species that join them in creating a fully functioning shellfish reef.

Helping us along the way will be a growing band of enthusiastic volunteers.

It is very satisfying to see that implementation of catchment management & sustainable farming practices has improved the health of Oyster Harbour to the point where the restoration of seagrasses & flat oyster reefs can be viable.

The ocean’s complex and diverse nature has fascinated me for as long as I can remember. I am excited to be involved and I see this initiative as an incredible opportunity to help restore an ecosystem on the brink of extinction.

Moss Kilby-Glencross

Student of UWA Albany and proud TNC volunteer.

Future Plans for Oyster Harbour

With the ecological knowledge and community support obtained during the earlier stages of the project, we hope to take the project to a whole-of-system scale—constructing somewhere between five and 10 hectares of new reef! At this scale we will begin to make a measurable difference to fish abundance, water quality and the productivity of Oyster Harbour.

It’s going to take time and commitment from lots of people throughout the community, but we have the experience and determination to successfully restore the shellfish reefs of Oyster Harbour for the benefit of people and nature.

If you live in the Albany area and would like to be involved in the project, contact Alex Hams at alex.hams@tnc.org.